You might have noticed that I tend to avoid the pointless RL posts with no point and too much redundancy. But I'm still drunk. That's what happens when you're skinny, don't drink much, and therefore have no tolerance.

At two drinks I was doing decently at poker (by my standards). $10 buy in and I was at $12 or more. In contrast my dad had run out, my brother had bought in again, and my other brother the same. Two friends were making out like bandits. Then I started on the third drink and my funds went almost straight down. The friends ended up splitting something like $60 between the two of them and both my brothers were bought in twice with one totally empty. I ended at $2.70, took $2.50 since there were quarters, and decided it had been a decent night.

I shouldn't have had the third. Or maybe it was the lack of lime. Corona really isn't that good, but the lime makes it better.

My day started with painting and smoke alarms going off next to my ear while I was installing them. My oldest brother yelled a lot. The other yelled a lot when he lost all his money. He doesn't seem to understand that poker is a mixture of luck and not choosing to lose your money.

Obama's socialist government is stealing an hour from us for 'conservation'. True story.

4
comments:

Anonymous
said...

"He doesn't seem to understand that poker is a mixture of luck and not choosing to lose your money."

I played poker semi-professionaly for two years and have played and studied the game for a very long time. And I just want to let you know that this is wrong.

It would be hard to elaborate as where do I begin? Starting hand percentages, implied odds, position, relative position, negative implied odds, value betting, the list goes on and on. It wouldn't be a reply, it would be a blog post in itself.

Needless to say, you are incorrect and if you are interested in learning more I recommend "Getting started in Hold em" by Ed Miller as a starting point. With that book under your belt you should be well on your way to crushing that home poker game.

One thing I will say is this: there is a small luck factor in poker, but this is the most beautiful part. Luck serves to keep losing players in the game. If they never won then they would stop playing, but luck lets them win every now and again which gives the good players another shot at their money.

Probably going a bit too far, but while luck will be factor--and a variable one depending on what game of poker you are playing--good players minimize luck--though they still need it to win.

You start by playing your own hand correctly--have a pair of 2s? That is a loosing hand (unless you can make a strong bet late in the round to steal the ante). Any player has about a 2/3 chance of pairing something in his blind. You only have a 1 in 5 chance of getting 3 of a kind. (2 winning cards (outs) * 5 cards to be drawn * ~2 = ~20%)

Value hands are where you bet, crap hands are when you fold--saving your money for when you have the value hands.

Luck has less to do with it because good players will know the odds and play the percentages. There are times in poker where playing a 1 in 3 or 1 in 4 chance is a good play--because it may only cost you 1 dollar to make 5.